The Last Four Years
by gotwingsbaby
Summary: Their partnership lasted four years. When remembering should one start the beginning and work forward or begin at the end and go back? A TIVA story told two ways in fourteen parts. NOW COMPLETE.
1. Still Hurting

AN: For those of you that aren't musical junkies like me, The Last Five Years is a musical about a relationship between two people. Cathy tells the story from the moment Jamie leaves her backwards to the night of their first date. Jamie tells his story from the day he meets Cathy up to the moment he leaves her for another woman. Their pieces alternate, coming closer and closer in time until they meet in the middle before moving away again. It's truly beautiful and I recommend it to everyone.

This story is modeled after that format and the chapter titles are song titles from the show, thus this story coming to you in fourteen parts. Ziva from end to beginning, Tony from beginning to end.

Ziva's POV in Aliyah.

------------------------------------------------------------

Lying broken and beaten on floor, tied to a chair turned over on its side, left one with a lot of time to think.

Her mind went to the same place it always did when she left herself enough energy without enough diversion; Tony.

Four years they'd been partners. Four years and he still hadn't learned to trust her. Sure, he trusted that she would be able to handle his six in a fire fight but that was because of her 'crazy ninja skills' more than it was because he actually trusted her as a person.

As a foot connected with her ribs she wondered if he had ever known her. If they had ever really known each other.

He had really thought that she was some sort of spy infiltrating NCIS. He had thought she would lie to Gibbs. For days he had sniffed around her affairs, suspecting her of espionage.

And then he had taken away the only man to ever love her. But she supposed she couldn't even be sure of that anymore.

She was no fool. She had not loved Michael. She had wanted to love Michael but that was not the same. She had tried to love Michael, in the dark of the night with her cheek pillowed on his chest she had tried to conjure up the same emotions she'd fought against when she'd been Sophie Ranier in a similar position. She had tried but she had failed to actually do it. But Michael had not asked for more than that.

The only person who was ever asking more of her was Tony.

Always pushing and prodding. Making suggestions and comments. Making her want more of something she couldn't define.

But never following through.

She didn't know if it was just his nature, to want the things he could not have, or if he enjoyed trying to make her rise to the bait only to pull it away at the last second. She was not naïve enough to think it was something as silly as Gibbs' rules that kept him in check.

It was everything she could do to keep up.

The butt of a gun slammed against her already swollen and bruised cheekbone and she struggled against a wave of nausea and unconsciousness.

He repeated over and over that it was kill or be killed. His apologies sounded hollow and insincere.

She had so desperately wanted to pull the trigger into his knee.

Not his heart. Never that. She could not wish him dead no matter how much she hated him.

He was so smug; all she had wanted was someone to love her. It hadn't needed to be the next epic love story or full of sparks or fireworks or anything explosive. Having someone in her bed at night that cared, or at least pretended to care, about her would have been enough. She could have been content. Maybe not happy every day forever, but content was more than most people got.

He couldn't even let her have that.

It was as if he operated under the assumption that if he couldn't have her then no one could. He seemed hell bent on making sure she wound up alone, relying on the barbs and innuendos he sent her way every once in a while for the rest of her days.

Well fuck that. And fuck him too.

Even taking into consideration her current state, she knew telling Gibbs she had to stay behind was the right thing to do.

Spending one more day sitting across the bullpen from him, listening to him further degrade some woman by bragging about his sexual conquest, hearing him make another movie reference, would have killed her. She had been hanging on by a thread as it was. Every day she hadn't broken down in tears or launched herself at him from across the bullpen had been no small victory.

But adding into the mix his murdering of the one person with whom she could have conceived a future with would have been too much.

They never would have been able to work together again. Not like they had in the past.

Tony had broken them.

A hand grasped her wrist, bound behind her back, and cruelly bent and re-broke her index and middle finger while simultaneously breaking her ring finger.

As she slipped into unconsciousness, pain and hunger pulling her into the darkness, she saw his face looking up at her from under the barrel of her gun. He had not even bothered to fight back.

He had broken them.

------------------------------------------------------------

I don't own NCIS blah blah blah.


	2. Shiksa Goddess

Tony's POV in Under Covers.

------------------------------------------------------------

She hadn't been with them very long. A couple weeks at most.

And yet there was no one else I would have rather been on this assignment with than Ziva.

It had nothing to do with the fact that McGeek wouldn't have looked at where near as amazing in that green silk dress. It had nothing to do with the fact that she was beautiful and exotic and oh-so-deadly. It had nothing to do with the fact that if it weren't for her he would have been playing a very wrong game with the Probie that would have reminded him too much of the time he kissed the tranny.

In the short weeks since she had joined their team he had learned to trust her.

It wasn't Gibbs' infamous gut but the girl had instincts.

Kate had been one of a kind and he missed her terribly. She'd been a sister to him, the Probie his kid brother, Ducky the loveable but odd Uncle, Abby the childhood friend you never want to be with but finds a way into your family anyway through siblings, and Gibbs the reluctant father of them all. They had been a family and her death had left a hole no one would ever fill.

The taste of her blood and brain matter in his mouth still haunted him.

Ziva could never replace Kate even if they sat in the same desk. But she was quickly carving her own niche into their family.. He wasn't sure how he'd categorize her, though.

Maybe the distant cousin it wouldn't be illegal to take home and get cozy with beneath the sheets.

When she'd first joined she'd been a soggy puzzle piece, the cardboard wet and warped and unable to fit into the designated spot. But over the past couple of weeks the cardboard was drying and she had snapped into place. The fact that she fit with them was why he was glad to have her there, not because she wasn't McGee in a wig.

But the fact that she was a woman made it easier to enjoy the innuendo Sophie made for Jean-Paul. Made it easier to enjoy the warm press of her lips against his. Made it easier to grasp her soft curves with curious hands. Made it easier to pull her close and pretend to be a husband about to make love to his wife.

And it made it harder to remain professional when green silk pooled on the floor.

He tripped over himself trying to get out of his suit.

He froze in place when a lacy pink bra and panty set joined the silk on the carpet.

She seemed to have no qualms about nakedness and his mouth went dry at the prospect of keeping himself in check when he knew she looked like that.

He knew he wasn't supposed to be thinking about his coworkers like that. Gibbs had rules for a reason; number twelve- never date a coworker. When things went South, and they would because he was who he was and she was insane, they would still be expected to put their lives on the line for each other. Hard feelings had no place in their work environment but were unavoidable in a break up.

One knee onto the bed, then the other, until he was hovering over her with the sheet protecting their modesty.

She initiated the next kiss, pulling him in close enough to know that the sheet protected nothing, and he thought of anything he could to keep his blood from pooling in his groin. McGoo in a dress. The Autopsy Gremlin in a dress. Ducky in a dress. Gibbs in a dress.

He moved over top of her like he was Jean-Paul making love to his wife.

When the image of Gibbs faded from his mind he hardened. He told her it was his knee and forced Gibbs into a skimpier dress.

They were putting on a show just in case the room was already under surveillance and damn what a show it was. She make noises loud enough for microphones that might be hidden around the room and he had to up the ante. McGoogle naked. Jimmy naked. Ducky naked. Gibbs naked.

When she rolled them over to straddle him her curls hung down into his face, creating a curtain that momentarily shielded them from the rest of the world. He wanted to keep it that way but his hands itched to touch them. He reached up and tangled his fingers in the dark strands, lifting them up and gathering them at the back of her head.

It was as soft as he'd thought it might be.

She kissed him hard again and he wondered if that was how she imagined Sophie Ranier would kiss Jean-Paul or if this was Ziva David shining through. He hoped it was the latter even though he knew there wasn't a popsicle's chance in hell he would ever know for sure.

He forgot about Gibbs naked.

His eyes rolled into the back of his head for a moment as her knee connected with the erection that had returned full force.

------------------------------------------------------------

I don't own NCIS blah blah blah.


	3. See I'm Smiling

Ziva's POV in Cloak.

------------------------------------------------------------

He tells her that he is tired of pretending. She tells him that she is too.

But as he leaves the elevator in pursuit of Gibbs, hot under the collar about having been deceived and lied to yet again, she wonders if they meant the same thing.

Once she would have considered them on the same page, constantly in sync with one another and completely attune to one another's thoughts. She always knew exactly what he was thinking when he'd looked at her; a mystery to everyone else but she had seen every thought in those bright green eyes. He'd been an open book to her.

But years of unresolved sexual tension had created barriers.

They had been a necessary precaution. Too much flirting had left her vulnerable and wanting but it was a game to Tony.

Everything was always a game.

She had had to find a way to protect herself, shield her heart from succumbing to the charm of Anthony DiNozzo. Every encounter was sizzling and left her with burns that never got the chance to heal. She was still getting burned but the skin was thicker, rougher from all of the abuse and that made it hurt a little less every time he got too close.

It did not keep her from getting burned but it hurt less.

Her words and actions were guarded and his eyes were no longer as readable as they'd once been. They were protecting themselves and from what she dare not define.

But when he cornered her in the elevator she had hoped they were once again on equal footing.

It had been some kind of painful hearing that shot ring out, the sound loud enough to make it sound as though she was listening to someone talk overhead from below the surface of the pool she'd played in as a child. He had gone down and for a second she had been certain she had lost him all over again. She'd seen red and immediately went into that dark place in the back of her mind where she'd once retreated during her missions as an assassin.

It never occurred to her that the bullets were fake.

She'd had no reason to consider it.

If it weren't for the fact that they'd already been ambushed, that she had already started to follow the order not to engage, she would have killed each and every one of those soldiers. Only the fact that she had let them close enough for contact before Tony was shot kept them from having their necks broken by connecting their gun to her temple.

She had been given a second chance with these people, the family she'd never had before leaving her birthplace, and she thought she'd blown it.

Without Tony they would have all fallen apart.

It was strange how the least skilled of them all was the least expendable.

She had seen the fury in his eyes and followed him into the elevator, hoping to find the way to tell him all the things she did not even understand. Emotions swirled in her head, her heart, her gut. She had not been trained to deal with emotions; bullet wounds and weapon maintenance sure, but emotional issues left her clueless. She knew something was there but didn't know what.

He had railed into her, forcing her to take some of the blame for his frustrations.

She was nobody's whipping girl and she railed right back at him, but she had been willing to give him an inch. She wasn't supposed to have engaged.

And for a second she had thought it was all worth it; every burn, every frustrating moment. He had been close enough to kiss with little movement on her part. The anger in his eyes could have shifted in an instant to sexual desire- the two impulses being similar.

He'd declared that he was tired of pretending. She'd told him she was too.

But as the elevator doors slid shut, leaving her alone in Gibbs' conference room, she didn't think he was talking about pretending to be unaffected by their playful banter. About pretending not to want something more than worn barbs and thinly veiled innuendos.

The metallic surface of the elevator doors provided the perfect place for her to study her own reflection and she could see the lines in her face, around the edges of her mouth. Disappointment. Frustration. Longing. All of it had been etched too deeply into her skin after three and a half years of the abuse she let him heap upon her.

He had done this to her by once again showing her a glimpse of something, making her think once again that he was finally ready to be a man and make a move.

She wasn't sure what he had been tired of pretending about.

But it wasn't about pretending not to love her.

------------------------------------------------------------

I don't own NCIS blah blah blah.


	4. Moving Too Fast

Tony's POV in Shalom.

------------------------------------------------------------

The summer Gibbs was retired was the longest of his life.

Summers in Cincinnati as a child were short and over far too fast. Summers in Columbus as a college co-ed were even shorter, half of it blocked out in a drunken haze. Summers as an adult were like any other season because he was too busy working to notice any of it go by any faster or slower than normal.

But the summer Gibbs was gone meant he had had to fill some pretty gargantuan shoes their fearless leader had left behind. It was hard to keep up with what the team wanted; they wanted him to be like Gibbs and anticipate their every action, their every answer. But they didn't want him to be like Gibbs; when he started practically mainlining caffeine just to keep up with the paperwork and the increased hours and the stress of leading a team they made fun of him.

It didn't help that they had known him first as the play boy and now couldn't respect him.

They still treated him like Tony instead of their boss. McGee argued back with him over things he never would have dared argue with Gibbs about. Ziva laughed at him openly and frequently when she never would have laughed at Gibbs to his face. Abby, well Abby treated him but that had more to do with the fact that she had always been so familiar with Gibbs.

However, she always reminding them that he was coming back. They all reminded him of that. Every time he went down into the lab he was assaulted by the images of the leader that had abandoned them.

Everyone else was too wrapped up in hero worship to remember that Gibbs had abandoned them.

But he couldn't forget.

His own father had been an asshole. Drove his mother to drink until she finally died of liver failure. Married younger and younger versions of Anna Nicole Smith. Cut his own son out of his life and his will.

He'd long since gotten over that particular brand of self-pity and had instead, at least mentally, adopted the stern former-Marine as his surrogate father.

And he'd abandoned them.

The only thing that made the self-doubts and the constant frustrations ease was nights spent at Ziva's place.

It started innocently enough.

He'd come over one evening holding a pizza and a DVD and she let him in with a roll of her eyes. Their latest case had been hard, too hard, and his abilities had been called into question over and over again. He'd just wanted a little company but Abby had been bowling. McGee had actually been out on a date. Even Ducky had had plans. Ziva had been a last resort but after that night she was always his first choice.

The nights he spent over there increased in frequency and duration until he was sleeping on her couch four, five nights a week.

Gibbs had told him to make his own rules to live by. His rule twelve was to never eat pizza for more than two meals in the same day. There wasn't a rule about sleeping with or dating or otherwise being romantically involved with someone he worked with.

But he'd never quite worked up the courage to kiss her.

Tony DiNozzo; seasoned play boy and expert at getting women had been afraid to kiss one girl.

It was hard to take something they'd established for a year and turn it into something new. He already knew they'd worked so well as partners. But what if that didn't translate the same way into a relationship?

And before he got a chance to find out Gibbs was back.

He said he wasn't staying. He said he was only there to help Ziva clear her name because she'd called him. He said he was going back to Mexico to drink beer on the beach as soon as it was over.

Another shot to the confidence that she hadn't even considered call him for help, she'd run straight to Gibbs.

He'd known as soon as Gibbs had come running back for Ziva it wouldn't be long until he was back for good.

And he'd also known that nights spent with his head in her lap with a couple of beer bottles littering her coffee table alongside an empty pizza box while yet another one of his favorites played in the background were over. If Gibbs was coming back then there would be a rule twelve again. There would be a line drawn across the bull pen again that they could tiptoe around but never cross.

He stood in Gibbs' basement next to the skeleton of a boat and stared hard at her solemn features and felt incompetent for having failed.

Whatever it was that he thought might have taken off between them after all the times they'd spent together that summer wasn't going to be going anywhere after all.

Because she'd called Gibbs instead.

------------------------------------------------------------

I don't own NCIS blah blah blah.


	5. A Part of That

Ziva's POV in Nine Lives.

------------------------------------------------------------

There were loose ends to tie up, or so her father informed her.

She did not leave 'loose ends'. Her missions ended smoothly, quickly, efficiently. Sometimes, when the circumstances changed, they ended rather violently like they did in Morocco. But they ended. Once she turned in the requisite paperwork there was never anything left to say, anything left to do.

Her targets were dead. Her objective accomplished. She did not leave 'loose ends' to be tied up. And she resented the implication that she could perform her duties so sub-standardly.

But she suspected her father was trying to foster the relationship he had seen blooming between her and Michael during her four months back with Mossad that summer.

Tony informed her that it was a rotten time to be going on vacation. And she knew it was true.

She had really just come back. They had just gotten Tony back from the USS Reagan and they were finally back to their full operating potential. Everyone was happy, or at least as happy as they had been before Los Angeles, before Jenny died, before they'd been torn asunder from the one person that had anchored them all together. The mole had been ferreted out. Everything was back to the way it was supposed to be. Everything was normal again.

But it wasn't.

They had all come back from their respective times spent away different people. Not overtly so; Tony was still the wisecracking senior field agent, Tim still the somewhat bumbling and nerdy junior agent. Abby was still a bundle of energy in goth makeup and Ducky was still the endearing old Scottish medical examiner. Gibbs was still… he was still Gibbs. And she? She was still the foreign operative without a firm grasp on American idioms.

Below the surfaces they all harbored new cracks. They were all a little jaded and distrustful. Not necessarily of each other but of the world in its entirety. They had seen what would happen when their family was finally broken up for good. They had all been forced to realize they could not function as a single unit forever.

Eventually they would each have to move on.

He offered her a neck pillow for her flight to Tel Aviv.

She cracked a smile but informed him she was flying first class. She would not need a neck pillow when her seat practically became a bed. He seemed disappointed he could not send her off with his pillow.

She wondered if he'd wanted her to have some personal item of his so she would feel obligated to return to give it back. She did not think he trusted her to come back to him. To them all. The smile slipped from her face as she realized she was not sure she wanted to anymore.

The barriers between the teammates were tangible even if they operated around them, ignoring their existence. She did not know if she could stand to be so close and yet so far from all of them all because she knew what she was missing. In Tel Aviv no one expected her to have the emotional connection. No one expected to form familial bonds. She would miss them all but she would survive.

She always did.

"_Nisiyah tovah"_ he said to her. Bon Voyage.

She looked up at him in surprise. Of anyone she had expected to learn Hebrew, even just a phrase, Tony would have been last on her list. Ducky or Abby first, McGee even, Gibbs. Not Tony. He was so lazy, so immature. So inconsiderate. He was not the type of person to go that extra mile over something so seemingly inconsequential.

It was undoubtedly gestures such as that that got Tony so many women. He could be charming when he wanted to be but she had always wondered how any woman over the age of eighteen had not seen right through them. How had Jeanne not known he was playing her? But she supposed if he pulled those kinds of aces from his sleeves with every woman it was not hard to see way so many women wound up in his bed at night.

She wondered how long he had spent practicing. He'd gotten the pronunciation exactly right.

Her smile returned and she reassured him that she would see him next week.

She'd seen the relief in his green eyes. The understanding of what she meant with a simple farewell. She would see him again. They would not spend another four months apart. She wouldn't be tearing their team apart again so soon. It was just a week, just a vacation to her homeland and then she would be back.

His gesture had served its purpose. The walls and barriers were there but surely, surely they could be torn down. He had restored her faith that their team was not forever broken on the inside but rather, just wounded. They could heal from their time apart and become the family she longed for.

The temptation to look backwards as she headed for the elevators was great.

But she did not need to look to know he would be sitting there still.

Tony was always there.

------------------------------------------------------------

I don't own NCIS blah blah blah.


	6. The Schmuel Song

Tony's POV in Grace Period.

------------------------------------------------------------

He hated keeping secrets from her. And Jeanne Benoit was a big secret.

His mustang zipped in and out of the lanes. Gibbs and Ziva would be proud.

Director Shepard had made it very clear that the nature of his mission (or whatever the hell it was supposed to be) was to be kept just between the two of them. No one else was supposed to know that he and Jeanne were anything but a normal couple and the people he worked with weren't even really supposed to know he was in a relationship that went on longer than drinks at the bar and a party between the sheets.

For the first time since he joined the team he felt like an outsider.

Normally he was all for a little secret keeping, a little espionage. It made him feel like James Bond; the cool James Bond. The Sean Connery James Bond, not the newer and slightly gayer Daniel Craig James Bond. His mission was to seduce a pretty girl to get information about an international arms dealer; classic Bond mission. But this mission to seduce Jeanne Benoit didn't feel cool at all.

It felt like lying. And it was.

To make matters worse the lying went beyond the obvious falsehoods he was spinning to Jeanne about who he was, what he did for a living, how they met, or basically anything else. He was lying to Gibbs about where he was going. He was lying to the probie about who was calling. He was being secretive where normally he had no qualms about announcing across the entire room everything from what he'd done to the night before to what he ate for lunch or what color socks he was wearing.

He dropped his foot on the gas. He was moments away from an emotional breakdown and he needed to just be there already.

But the worst part, the absolute worst part? Lying to Ziva. Ziva was his partner, she had his back at all times for any reason and he the same for her. But she was protecting someone who wasn't telling her the truth; he was putting her in a situation where she had to guard his back when she had no idea what to expect. It wasn't right and it wasn't fair. And he didn't really have much of a choice.

She seemed so concerned. His lying hadn't fooled her completely. Hell, it probably didn't fool anyone completely, but she was reading into the situation what she could and he was letting her do it blind. He couldn't tell her the truth and that was the only thing that would have eased her suspicious ninja mind. So he had to let her worry, had to let her wonder where he went when his phone rang in the middle of a crime scene, had to wonder why he was running around with hospital bracelets on.

He felt like a horrible person.

He felt like he was betraying the friendship they'd built just a couple summers before. Betraying the partnership they had spent two years perfecting. The guilt was eating him alive. Literally. He was pretty sure that between that and the stress of maintaining two separate identities and a fulltime relationship was giving him an ulcer.

Every lie, every secret, and everything he didn't say was building this wall between them that he didn't want to be there. He wanted things to stay easy between them. The partnership, the teasing, the banter, even the thinly veiled flirting. He wanted it all to stay the same. But he was watching it all deteriorate in front of his eyes and he had no idea how to stop it. How to salvage what was left of his real life.

He pressed the accelerator further towards the floorboards.

Paula Cassidy had given everything for them. Had given her life for them.

He had no idea what to think, what to do. In that split second, before Paula had intervened, he had become aware of the fact that he could be about to lose Ziva forever. Faced with his own death by suicide bomber he had been more concerned with the fact that he would not see Ziva anymore, not Jeanne.

He didn't have to worry about that anymore. Because Paula had taken on a suicide bomber and saved them all.

He was sad about Paula's death. There was no mistaking that point. She was a great agent and NCIS wouldn't be the same without her. He was eternally grateful for her sacrifice and he was going to miss her almost as much as he missed Kate. But her death had not sunk in yet. He knew she was dead but he didn't feel like she was dead yet.

It was that feeling of grief, of desperation that Ziva was about to die, that clung to him long after the smoke had cleared.

He was facing two very different definitions of love and the contradictions were tearing him apart.

The love he felt for Jeanne was sweet and adoring, the kind that chick flicks were made of. He knew that he could be content forever with someone like Jeanne; real passion was absent but she made him happy. The love he felt for Ziva, however, was raw and dangerous and he was pretty sure that if he didn't keep it checked and buried it could consume him whole and not in a good way. Both were forbidden.

Drunk with anguish and feelings he shouldn't be having, he stumbled up to her door and knocked. He just needed someone to hold him close and ground him, anchor him to the Earth. He needed to feel alive, it didn't matter with whom.

But he still wished it was Ziva's face he saw when the door swung open.

------------------------------------------------------------

I don't own NCIS blah blah blah.


	7. Summer in Ohio

Ziva's POV in Last Man Standing.

------------------------------------------------------------

She missed him more than she would ever care to admit out loud.

The microphone was warm in her palm. She knew she was supposed to be focusing on the crowd but her mind wandered.

So far the summer had not been a particularly pleasant one. She had gotten soft in her two years in America and her Mossad colleagues wasted no time in informing her of such. They cut her no slack, offered her no condolences, and expected nothing but the best from her.

And she didn't want it any other way.

The focus required allowed her not to think of all the things she'd left behind. Of all the thing's she'd lost.

Her first night back her father took her into his study and together they consumed an entire bottle of scotch. She may or may not have had twice as much as he had and she may or may not have wished it was bourbon and she may or may not have drunkenly confessed to him as he led her up to the bedroom she hadn't occupied since she was eighteen that she killed her brother to save Gibbs. She couldn't really remember what was real and what she'd made up.

After that there was no more celebrating her return. He went back to being the Director and she the officer that happened to live in his house. It made her miss Gibbs. True that Gibbs was not the most emotive boss she could have ever had but he was more of a father to her than her own father could have been and a more effective leader. He gave a front of ruling by fear but the real guiding force was respect. Her father could make no such claim.

Her third day back to Mossad she was partnered with Michael Rivkin. He was an asshole and made many wisecracks about inappropriate things. He leered at her without regard for how many different ways she could kill him without even blinking an eye. He reminded her of Tony.

But he was not Tony. For one Michael was impervious to her death threats; he knew all the ways she could kill him and then some. His joking and teasing was entirely sexually based. There was no joking glint, no friendly undertones. And to top it all off he had the audacity to act upon his promises and flirtations where Tony had not.

She hated him. But by day seven in Israel she had slept with him anyway.

Michael was sitting by the bar. Her eyes found his quickly and his appreciation of the backless nature of her dress was evident in his dark espresso colored eyes. He was not Tony but he was certainly attractive enough.

She could hardly be blamed for succumbing.

It had only been a week but she felt so disconnected. She'd been torn asunder from NCIS and everything she had long since come to call home. Gibbs remained with a new team of agents to train and she was jealous of each and every one of them. Abby remained in her lab but emailed and called her constantly that she was miserable without her, Tony, and McGee. Tim was down in Cyber Crimes, his investigative skills withering away without natural light but at least he had emailed once already. Ducky had written her a letter.

And yet none of their attempts at communication had made her feel any better. In fact it had just highlighted the distance, making her painfully aware of every mile between them. She replied to each half-heartedly and knew she would not be doing that often. She would have made the effort for one, however. The one that wasn't putting forth the same.

Tony was on a ship only God knew where. Logically she knew that making phone calls or emails would have been difficult for him. It was difficult for all the sailors. It had only been a week.

But she had a feeling he wasn't going to be calling.

They had turned her into someone new. Someone the rest of Mossad didn't recognize. And she wasn't sure which of the two versions of herself she wanted to be. The new her had felt right, she had felt alive, and she had enjoyed having real friends. But the old her wouldn't have felt so horrible being kept away from five people. The old her wouldn't have felt anything at all; she would have accepted her new mission with a straight face and a strange determination.

So she acted on the instincts of a woman she had long since buried deep inside.

She was the old Ziva when she slept with Michael. She was the old Ziva when she used her new partner to make her forget about her old partner. She was the old Ziva when she took the opportunity to take advantage of a familiar situation when she wouldn't have dared to do so if it had been _him. _

The words rolled effortlessly off of her tongue, the seductive swing of her hips mindless. The Moroccan bar drank in every word, they were her captive audience. It was a shame they couldn't hold her attention so easily.

For all of her effort, though, the new Ziva refused to remain buried. She could not forget the sights and smells of home even when her mind reminded her that she was home now. The new Ziva would not, could not let go of her emotional attachments to Abby and McGee and Gibbs and… and Tony. The new Ziva reminded her every time she let Michael touch her that she wished she had taken that plunge with a different partner.

Her eyes connected with the brief case that had been left behind and the bottom dropped out of her stomach.

Thousands of miles away Tony could still distract her from the important things. And it was going to kill her.

The world went white. Then everything was black.

------------------------------------------------------------

I don't own NCIS blah blah blah.


	8. The Next Ten Minutes

Tony then Ziva's POVs in Judgment Day. I found this a fitting episode for their stories to intersect.

------------------------------------------------------------

He had seen many women in various states of undress in his lifetime. Many, many women.

But there was something supremely alluring about seeing his partner in a skimpy bikini lying on her side next to the hotel pool, the sensuous curve of her hip exposed while she read a book. More so than almost every woman he could recall having had the privilege of seeing semi-nude. And he couldn't have her.

Damn Gibbs and his rules.

He'd known as soon as he bent over that pool chair that he was a goner. That skimpy little bikini was all that was on his mind. That, and the sight of her head thrown back against the black leather interior of his rented red mustang, the column of her neck exposed and her hair in loose curls that he knew weren't actually natural, and a throaty laugh bubbling up from within. All he could think about was that he was in love again.

She was going to be the death of him one way or another.

So enraptured with her he ignored his gut when she told him that something was amiss with the Director. So drunk with the chance to spend some time with her like they had that summer Gibbs had been drinking Jose Cuervo and Coronas on white sandy beaches he stubbornly refused to listen that Jenny was acting strange. Or at least, stranger than usual. So distracted by his desire to reach out and run his fingers against that beautiful dark skin that he forgot everything Gibbs told him and head slapped into his brain.

Could he really be blamed? He just wanted one afternoon. The director had given them the time off. She had specifically ordered them to stand down. All he wanted to do was drive a hot car a little too fast with a gorgeous woman in the passenger seat with her long hair blowing in the wind for one afternoon. He knew something wasn't quite right but he wanted to feel like his life was in the movies for just once in his life.

But it had deteriorated quickly from there.

Ziva wouldn't let it go. Obviously she was not as distracted by him as he was by her, obviously he did not hold the same appeal to her, because she kept pushing and pushing. She called McGee and the director. Twice.

And he had followed along. If he didn't who knew what kind of body parts he could have lost. But that didn't stop him from arguing with her, picking and sniping at her. He was frustrated and he wanted her to be too.

They crossed the dusty desert with their guns drawn to the dilapidated old diner. His stomach sank as they entered.

Jenny was dead.

She couldn't believe it. Her eyes were taking in the director, her friend, lying in a pool of her own blood, but her mind refused to accept that it was really what she was seeing. She couldn't be dead. This was Jenny Shepard. They'd survived Paris together so Jenny knew that she could be trusted; then why hadn't she let her help? Maybe then she wouldn't be staring up at her with glassy eyes that saw nothing.

None of this would have happened if Tony had just listened to her.

How many times had she told him that something didn't feel right? How many times had she asked him to call Jenny, call McGee, and figure out what was going. He'd even continued to fight her when they found the director's car when the director was nowhere nearby and a dead girl with too many connections for her comfort.

If he had just listened to her when she had first brought up her gut instead of trying to force her to ride in some silly car then Jenny would be alive.

She knew something was wrong the moment the Director dismissed them from the funeral.

But she got swept up in Tony's infectious frivolity. He had been more than relieved to head out from a stuffy funeral for a man he hadn't known and take time to get out of the suit he'd been stuffed into and put on one of those stupid looking Hawaiian shirts. So jovial an expression she had followed him with minimal fight on her part.

At the hotel she changed quickly into the bathing suit she'd brought, a two piece for swimming laps late at night with the hope that Tony might be watching instead of the more practical one piece, and headed out to the pool chairs with a book.

However, the story had not come to life from the pages like it usually did. An English translation of a classic French story as since joining NCIS and immersing herself in English it had become her second most dominant language. She could speak French fluidly but reading it had fallen to the wayside in the last two years.

The book had not succeeded in distracting her from her gut screaming at her. Gibbs was wearing off on her.

And for a moment, when Tony hovered over her in like a predator that had trapped its prey, she had forgotten all her misgivings. She had gone back up to her room quickly to put on a green t-shirt and khaki's. It wasn't too far off from her usual wardrobe but she could not deny that she had chosen more tailored clothing on the off-chance of such an invitation.

Perhaps it was because Tony was her colleague. Perhaps it was because she spent so much time working with him that when she was with him her mind instantly made that same connection. Her gut came roaring back full force and she couldn't ignore that sinking feeling.

Work was calling them. It always did.

------------------------------------------------------------

I don't own NCIS blah blah blah.

I also wanted to thank everyone for their reviews. I appreciate the encouragement.


	9. A Miracle Would Happen

Tony's POV in post-Judgment Day pre-Last Man Standing.

------------------------------------------------------------

He throws a small hacky sack up and then down as he in his bunk late at night.

The ship rocks almost unperceivably beneath him, above him, around him entirely from his bunk in the middle of its hull. It's an entire floating city and so large that the rocking to and fro goes largely unnoticed on a calm night in the middle of the ocean. Most sailors tell him that once they got their sea legs they only notice the ship's movements when they're being tossed around like a child's toy in a bathtub by some storm.

But he notices.

He can feel every wave taking him further and further away from home. Away from Gibbs. Away from Abby. Away from McGee. He feels like it's taking him away from Ziva too but he's so disoriented and he has no idea where she really is that he could be getting closer to her for all he knows. It's the sentiment that matters, though, and he misses her the most.

Six weeks he's been on the floating prison and every day he hates Vance more and more.

On the third day on the ship he printed the pictures from his phone and pinned them up on the wall next to the door.

If Ziva were to see that he had put pictures of her half naked up for anyone to see she would kill him. Slowly. She'd take his fingernails off one by one, make sure it was physically impossible for him to take further enjoyment from said pictures, and then finish him off with a paperclip. But it was totally worth it.

Not that she would ever see the pictures. He was going to be stuck in the floating fortress for the rest of his life and she was going to be back with Mossad, back with her dad and the people she belonged with. She wouldn't have to worry about mixing up American idioms or holding back her 'shoot first ask questions later' nature.

And he would slowly rot away for eternity, forever plagued with being the playground monitor to an entire ship full of kindergarteners. A slap on the wrist for a skirmish, a stern reprimand for not following protocols. If he was lucky one of them would be up for ruining his career over some drug money and give him something real to do. It was wrong for him to wish such horrible things on kids so young but he was bored and he wanted to be a real cop again.

He starts throwing the hacky sack against the ceiling and catching it on the backlash. It makes a thunking sound he is sure will annoy the person above him but he couldn't possibly care if he wanted to.

Every minute of every day he misses Abby and her eccentric dress and her ear splitting music. He misses McGeek and the rapid click of his fingers on the keyboard as opposed to the rest of their much slower tapping as they hunt and peck. He misses Gibbs, the smell of coffee, and the feel of a hand connecting to the back of his head. He misses Ducky and his long winded and off topic tales. He even misses Palmer and Lee.

He misses his apartment and all the space; funny how he never would have considered it spacious until he was cramped into the same hole in the wall for his bunk and his office and his counseling center or whatever it was at that moment. He misses his DVD collection. He misses being able to order pizza whenever he feels like.

But most of all he misses her.

They were special. They always were. Their banter was light and easy and so much more sexually charged than the bickering he'd done with Kate. She was like a flame; he always wanted to reach out and touch it but he knew he would get burnt if he did and yet even knowing that he wanted to touch anyway.

He'd thought they had time.

He had thought that they could just wait out Gibbs. The man couldn't work at NCIS forever, they'd either force him into retirement or he'd die. He had to believe it was the latter because he couldn't imagine Gibbs ever being too old to work.

But someday the rules would have been gone. Permanently this time.

He'd thought he had the time to wait, let things simmer up to the top and hold until the exact moment he could crank the heat and watch the pot boil over. He knew they would be explosive together but he was supposed to have time to figure out if it was going to be a big flash and a loud boom but no real heat or if they would have a long, slow burn with heat so intense looking at the flame would burn retinas.

She was gone and he'd done nothing. He'd wasted time making jokes and leering at her from across the bullpen but never following through. He could have had everything. Granted, he could have also had nothing, but it could have been everything.

He wondered what she was doing right then. Probably being the super ninja spy she was trained to be. Not for the first time he considered calling, using one of the phone cards he'd purchased before shipping out. But like every other time he couldn't make himself get up and make the call from the phone at the end of the hall.

What was he supposed to say? The conversation would be halted and awkward. He didn't want to remember their partnership… their friendship that way.

The hacky sack is slammed against the ceiling one more time then allowed to come to rest on the pillow near his ear. He rolls on his side, careful not to roll off the side of the bed in the process, and in the dark his eyes seek out the shapes of the photos he's memorized.

If he could do it all again he would tell her everything.

------------------------------------------------------------

I don't own NCIS blah blah blah.


	10. Climbing Uphill

Ziva's POV in Bury Your Dead.

------------------------------------------------------------

She approaches what is left of a royal blue mustang and her stomach rolls unpleasantly.

Tears are stinging her eyes and clogging her throat. The acrid smell of burnt rubber and human flesh hung in the air like a thick blanket that coated every inch of her body. She knew she would be smelling it for weeks.

As an assassin she has seen many people die. Sometimes she watched the lucidity fade from their eyes as they bleed out over the knife she's plunged into their unsuspecting hearts. Other times she watched the body fall, her bullet between their eyes. She saw her own brother die this way, by her bullet all the same. She's seen people blown up, dismembered, and tortured to death. Watching people die is nothing new to her.

And yet when she watched Tony's car explode over live satellite feed through MTAC she reacts like it's the first time. Like she had never been trained to detach herself from the notion of death. Her pulse jumped in her throat and she cried out, standing up in her seat from disbelief. She waited for the smoke to clear, hoping it was an explosive more for show than anything else. When the feed did not show him crawling from the wreckage she gasped his name.

She felt her heart breaking.

McGee tries to remain upbeat. Tries to make them all think that it might not have been Tony in that car. But she can't fathom who else it could have been. She knows him to be oddly possessive of that vehicle and there wasn't a chance that he had willingly let someone else get behind the wheel. It hadn't been driven like it was stolen. He had been calm, in control of the car. He had been inside when the bomb went off.

She knows it's him. She hopes that it is not but she knows that it is.

A part of her resents Gibbs for making them process the scene. She knows Tony wouldn't want anyone else on the case and yet as she stands in the street, camera in hand, she hates him for making them be there. She does not want to witness in person the results of the devastating images on an oversized television screen.

They all have similar expression of disbelief as they make their way to the mustang.

In the front seat Tony's charred remains are slumped over the steering wheel and she feels vomit climbing into the back of her throat. She has to look away and her memory provides her with an all too common image of Tony smiling, his green eyes alight with mischief and humor. It could have been one of millions of moments since she'd joined the team. The image comforts her because it is so vivid for a moment none of the rest of it was real.

But when she looks back Tony is still dead. Still sitting there and she feels lightheaded from grief.

There were so many things she wanted to say to him, so many things she would never be able to convey to him in his current state. How can she tell him how much his friendship has meant to her now? How can she thank him for teaching her that life was not just about the mission and that there was value in a smile and a laugh now? How can she tell him that he is only one of two people she has ever come to trust implicitly now?

How can she tell him that she thought was falling in love with him now?

The answer is that she can't.

She knows she must live now for the rest of her life carrying the burden of things never said, actions never taken, hopes never fulfilled. It is a burden that she can feel weighing heavily upon her chest already and the smoke has barely cleared. It hangs its dead weight from her heart, crushing her lungs in the process and making it feel difficult to breathe and her limbs feel like their full of lead. Her body does not feel like her own.

She wonders how she is going to survive the rest of her life with that weight.

Tony is also not the first of her partners to die.

Her first partner, Aaron, was murdered by Hamas right in front of her before she got her bonds loose enough to plunge a knife into their captor's neck. Her fourth partner was gunned down in Palace Square in St Petersburg in the middle of the night during what was supposed to be an arms deal sting. Her fifth partner drowned in Venice. Her eighth was shot point blank in the chest after she took a bullet in her upper thigh during a mission in Cuba. She watched him bleed out.

A number of others died after they were technically no longer her partner. She could only think of one former partner at that moment that was still alive now. She was sad for their deaths, sad for the parents and wives and children they left behind, sad that each time Mossad lost another talented operative.

But none of their deaths had ever hurt her like this.

She was willing right then to trade anything to make the hurt go away not just for herself but for Abby. For Tim. For Ducky. For Jenny. For Gibbs. She would go to the ends of the Earth, do any task, trade her own humanity, _anything_ to erase what happened. Tony did not deserve to die, not like that, and it seemed less and less fair that it had happened exactly this way. He didn't deserve to die.

She would give her own life to have his back.

But that is not the way the world works.

Gibbs calls McGee forward, silently beckoning her as well. They have a job to do.

------------------------------------------------------------

I don't own NCIS blah blah blah.


	11. If I Didn't Believe In You

Tony's POV in Cloak.

------------------------------------------------------------

He tells her that he's tired of pretending. She tells him she is too.

He had not expected such a response. He had not expected her to understand what it was he was talking about, the meaning he'd wrapped up in vagueness. He had expected her to look up at him with her head cocked slightly to the left and her brow furrowed ever-so-slightly in confusion as she tried to ferret out meaning in what she would assume to be another stupid American idiom.

They stand, toe to toe, nose to nose, and he wonders how quickly she would kill him if he kissed her right then.

When he'd gotten back from the USS Ronald Reagan he'd had every intention of following through on all those promises he'd made to himself, alone in his bunk, about how if he ever saw her again he'd tell her the truth. He'd throw all of Gibbs' rules to the wayside and confess everything he'd been hiding from her for years.

She'd asked him why he hadn't called and he didn't have an answer for her right then. What use would it have been to tell her that he couldn't just talk to her on the phone like nothing was wrong, like nothing was different when it so clearly was? What use would it have been to tempt himself to telling her that he's loved her for so long? And she had been so clearly hurt by his lack of communication that he didn't know how to make it right.

But he had had the intentions of trying.

He'd just kept waiting for the opportune moment, practicing the speech in his head about how rules were meant to be broken and the thing growing between them deserved a chance. He had prepared and rehearsed every single thing he could think of to convince her that he was right and not to break his arm for even asking. He was ready, he just needed to find the right moment.

The moment never came.

Before he even got his bearings she and McGee were off to Pennsylvania. Then as soon as she gets back she puts in for leave to go back to Israel and he's left flabbergasted.

He knew. He knew right then that she had left someone behind when she came back to DC. His heart had sunk down into his shoes and everything he'd been practicing had died on his lips. All he'd been able to do was wish her a good trip. Because he'd known that it wouldn't be her last. She was going to go back again and maybe next time she wouldn't be back in a week, two weeks. Eventually she was going to go back to her homeland and stay there and they would never see her again.

He had been a fool to ever think otherwise.

Those feelings continued to plague him, though, haunting him over and over again. He couldn't shake something as steadfast as love. He'd learned that lesson after falling in love with Jeanne.

His lip and cheek ached, throbbing with the pulse that sped up standing so close to her in such a cramped, private space.

It reminded him of how badly he'd wanted to kiss her earlier, when they'd been pressed together, not breathing in that closet space, just trying not to get caught. Of course, this was before all hell had broken loose, but then he would have been more than content to stay right there, like that, forever. Except for the not breathing part, though he would gladly sacrifice a few breaths of fresh air if it were her lips preventing him from taking them in.

He had hoped she would have felt it too.

But she turned her head as soon as the guards were gone, obviously eager to get away from him. He'd thought he'd seen something in her eyes but he supposed that maybe he'd just seen it because he wanted to see it.

The bitter sting of disappointment stuck with him even through the fire alarm being pulled and their subsequent discovery by the guards. It stayed with him through their capture, through a beanbag bullet to the gut, and watching Ziva go ninja on some poor unsuspecting prison guards.

He tries to force himself to lean forward and kiss her.

It wouldn't end well and he knows it. They had had enough opportunities over the last three years and she was assertive enough that if she wanted to kiss him then she would have. But he wants to take the plunge and just kiss her anyway, feel that press of her lips like he hasn't in years now, not since they were Jean-Paul and Sophie.

He chickens out.

She's tired of pretending too. Tired of pretending she cares enough about him to flirt with him. Tired of pretending she doesn't mind that she can see right through him to all the emotions he's been trying to keep hidden. Tired of pretending that his not-so-subtle flirting across the bullpen is alright with her.

He makes some excuse about having been lied to again and steps off the elevator as the doors ping open. It takes him the entire walk to autopsy to remember the anger he felt at Gibbs for keeping him out of the loop, about not trusting any of them enough to handle the truth about the mission, the truth about their team.

The anger is real. He felt it and he hates being lied to and kept in the dark.

It's just not the most prominent hurt on his mind.

------------------------------------------------------------

I don't own NCIS blah blah blah.


	12. I Can Do Better Than That

Ziva's POV in Boxed In.

------------------------------------------------------------

They'd spent the day locked in a shipping container. He barely made it out alive.

Not because they'd been shot at, by the bad guys and by her genius move of shooting at the door, or because they'd had the brilliant idea of burning money and therefore almost died of smoke inhalation, or even because Tony had had the stellar idea of taking cover in the shipping container to begin with.

But rather because he came within a centimeter of being murdered by her own hand.

She had extended the olive branch to the rest of her coworkers by inviting them all over to her place to have dinner, though the gesture serves the dual purpose of showing them that she lived like any other normal human being and not in some sniper's nest or other equally ridiculous imaginative place they might have concocted for the assassin persona she still was not able to get them to drop.

Tony was supposed to be invited but he had made such a big deal about going out to see some wresting match. He had made numerous comments about how awesome it would be and how much fun she would have going to such an event and yet he had not thought to invite her along.

It had been a month since their undercover operation and two since she had transferred into their team and her relationships with the members of the team had improved drastically.

Abby was speaking to her, they were not the best of friends, but the relationship had made leaps and bounds and she was drawn to the contradictory parts of her personality. She had never had a best friend before but she could easily picture Abby in that role. Ducky no longer looked at her like he saw Kate every time. McGee seemed to regard her with a mixture of awe and fear but as long as he was nice to her she didn't much care. And Gibbs had taken on the role of teaching her to be a proper investigator with moderate enthusiasm.

And she and Tony? Well they bickered like children but ever since Sophie and Jean Paul the bickering had taken on a very sexually charged undertone. Or would it be overtone? They were hardly being discreet about it.

Though much of the time she found herself wondering if Tony said and did things like talk about something she would like then not extend an invitation were purposeful moves meant to hurt her.

So maybe the dinner had had a third purpose in making Tony jealous after the fact.

She knew he liked to be involved in everything. He liked to know everything about anything that was going on all the time. None of them were apparently allowed to have a personal life or keep anything private. It was an invasion of her privacy she was not used to and most of the time she found herself annoyed and exasperated. But only most of the time.

Hearing that everyone from Gibbs to Jimmy had been invited and he hadn't was a sure fire way to get back at him.

Yet in the hours they'd spent locked in that shipping container she had seen how much a move like that had hurt him. That made her feel guilty because she had not meant to hurt him, merely annoy him the same way that he had an uncanny ability of doing to her.

And she saw the difference her apology for excluding him when she thought they might actually die made.

So at the end of the day, despite how close she'd come to killing him herself and possibly against her better judgment, she invited him over for dinner.

He was overly dramatic, an attention hog, a bit of a dumbass, a lot of a jackass, and wildly inappropriate in almost every single way. In spite of all of that, and in some ways because of all that, she liked him anyway.

She drove him back her to her place since he seemed so affronted that McGee saw her apartment before him and while she rapidly changed lanes he alternated from recounting their experiences in the box and exclaiming things about how he had so narrowly escaped death already that day and did not want to tempt fate so she should let off the gas.

She questioned the sanity behind letting him into her apartment but he was actually mostly respectful of her things.

And he made good company in the kitchen. He pushed himself up onto the counter next to where she pulled out the ingredients for a simple but delicious chicken tetrazzini. While she mixed and measured and tossed things into a baking dish he sat and watched while telling her stories of the team before she joined.

He told her about when he met Gibbs, when Abby was hired, the first time Ducky waysided him with a story from his youth, and both the first time he met McGee and when McGee became his 'probie'. He also explained what probie really meant at her prompting. She had a general understanding but his simple explanation helped.

He carried the stack of dishes, napkins, silverware, and glasses she made with his good arm while she lifted items from it to set the table while the food finished baking off in the oven, filling the apartment with the most delightful smell since neither one of them had eaten since breakfast that morning.

She asked him why she was not his probie as well since she was even newer to the team and detective work than McGee while she was serving up their dinners.

He shrugged and told her it was because she was his partner while he dug in.

She smiled and thought maybe Tony would be better suited for the best friend role than she'd thought.

------------------------------------------------------------

I don't own NCIS blah blah blah.


	13. Nobody Needs to Know

Tony's POV in Aliyah.

------------------------------------------------------------

They stand on the tarmac and he can't meet her eye. He hasn't really been able to since he shot Rivkin, only unless she initiates it and even then it is only because he feels a guilt so heavy that he couldn't deny her if he wanted to.

But he'd rather stare at his feet, the wall, the back of Vance's head. Anywhere but at her.

He's afraid of her.

Lying prostrate on the ground beneath her, her gun digging into his knee, had been redeeming. His apologies hadn't been getting through to her, his insistence that if he hadn't shot Rivkin then he would have been shot himself had fallen on deaf ears. He didn't know what else to say to her, didn't know what else to do. If being her punching bag or being her target for shooting practice would help then he'd gladly do it.

But the Ziva that looked down at him with pain shining in her eyes was not the Ziva he knew.

The Ziva he knows is his friend. The Ziva he knows would never draw a gun on him in anything but jest. The Ziva he knows usually breaks that serious expression with a smile that usually leaves his heart hammering in his chest and his fingers itching to tangle in her dark curls. The Ziva he knows has brown eyes that are warm and deep, not steely and closed off. He does not know the Ziva above him and he wonders if this Ziva could really shoot him.

It's not like he doesn't deserve it. It's not like he has any excuses for the transformation of the woman he loves. He does deserve it so when she bore down on him he did not fight back. He reminds her of his stance, that he could have been the one with the bullet holes in his chest, but he did not fight her. He deserves it.

He killed the man she loves. Loved. Loves? He can't be sure how strong her feelings were and whether they transcended the barrier of death. But the point was that she definitely loved Michael while he was alive and he had taken that away from her. He hadn't meant to, it hadn't been his intention to kill anyone that night, but he'd done it.

He's the only one to blame for this.

She asked him if he was jealous and he'd scoffed at the question. But he was.

Jealousy had burned in his stomach in ways he had never experienced before. Having mostly transient relationships did not leave him much room for jealousy over women. He was frequently jealous at work when Gibbs seemed to favor one of his teammates over him. He got jealous when Ziva got too chummy with McGee and not him.

That was nothing compared to how much he'd hated Michael Rivkin for having Ziva when he couldn't.

He wanted Ziva to be happy more than anything in the world. He loves her; all he can think about is her happiness, something that seemed to be scarce ever since Agent Lee was killed in pursuit of a domestic terrorist. She has not smiled as much, she has not bantered as much, and she has not flirted much if at all.

But was it really so much to ask that she be happy with him?

It was now. He'd broken them and now they would never be happy together in any capacity; friends, partners, lovers.

He remarks that he is done with Israel, that his not coming back, and he seeks confirmation from Gibbs. He is all too happy to get on the plane even though he knows the flight back to DC in the cargo seats will be uncomfortable at best. He wants to get away from angry Directors and interrogation rooms disguised as conference rooms. He wants to get away from Vance's watchful gaze; he has never quite learned to trust the man since Domino.

The jump seat is as uncomfortable as it was two days ago when they'd flown out to Tel Aviv but he settles in, closes his eyes, and prepares himself for another flight that will be awkward and full of tense silences from the things no one will say to each other. He purposely sits next to Vance. It is the lesser of three evils.

Everyone is mad at him. Gibbs understands but is not pleased. Vance is pissed at the international mess he's created. Ziva just hates that he still breathes. Every so often, when she forces him to look her in the eye he sort of does too.

Gibbs and Ziva take a moment boarding. He imagines a tense goodbye between the Director and one of his Officers. He can't seem to think of Eli David as Ziva's father. Perhaps it is the lack of affection between the two, perhaps it is because although the thought of being a father just yet makes his stomach knot he can't ever imagine turning his daughter into a weapon like he has done with his. He would have to love her too much and he can't fathom how Eli doesn't feel the same.

But as the engines kick to life only Gibbs enters the rear of the plane and he feels the bottom of his stomach drop out.

"_Boss? One short?_" he asks, afraid of the answer. Gibbs' non-answer is all he needs.

He broke them so badly she chooses to abandon him, not that he can blame her, but also Gibbs and McGee and Abby and Ducky and Palmer. He thought they were all friends. He understands why she would want to not talk to him anymore, but why not just request McGee as a partner? Why leave everyone else? She hadn't even said goodbye to anyone but Gibbs.

The hatch closes and he looks out, trying to catch just one last glimpse of her, even if she's still mad at him. But she's already out of sight.

His head falls back against the webbing and he fights the urge to cry.

He had broken them. But he had not meant to.

------------------------------------------------------------

I don't own NCIS blah blah blah.


	14. Goodbye Until Tomorrow

Ziva's POV in Silver War. Fourteen days, fourteen chapters.

------------------------------------------------------------

It is obvious to her that he dislikes her. They all do.

They all think she is some wild, untamed assassin with absolutely no regard for human life or how they do things here in America, as if she would go off shooting wildly. They think she is nothing more than some spy, incapable of looking at a crime and seeing what transpired based on what was left, as if looking at evidence could possibly be that hard. They think they do not need her, do not need someone to pick up the slack in their team with one down.

Her feelings towards the rest of them are mutual. The only reason she is there is because Jenny is her friend and also the Director of NCIS. She is there because her friend allowed her the chance to get away from a potentially dangerous place.

She has a grudging respect for their leader, Agent Gibbs. It's hard not to. The man is the antithesis of charismatic and yet he commands the esteem of almost everyone in his general vicinity. Even when he was telling her that her brother was a murderer she respected him, respected that gut that he couldn't possibly quantify to her.

But while she respects him it is obvious that he does not like her. He does not stop to consider that she did not just kill her half-brother to save his life but that in doing so she risked her own. It is something he knows as the report says that he made the kill shot but he does not seem to hold that fact in very high regard. If her father found out that she was the one that pulled the trigger he would smile, send her on a suicide mission, and then bury her quietly beside Ari and Tali.

He trusts her aim, trusts her to pull that trigger, but he does not like her.

So she respects him but she does not necessarily like him either.

She is ambivalent towards the rest of the team. Ducky is nice in a very old codger sort of way but his affections for the late Kate Todd are evident. Abby is the best at her job and that impresses her yet the disdain is almost overwhelming. McGee seemed like a barely competent investigator but his demeanor was amenable.

After seeing Agent DiNozzo come in, however, what little respect she'd had for him flew out the window. Who came to work in last night's jeans, a wife beater, and clearly unwashed? The man brushed his teeth in his filing cabinet for God's sake. It was disgusting and Mossad would have never allowed such sloppiness.

She finds it oddly arousing. And that makes her scowl for a moment.

Even so, she does not hate them. She does not resent them for replacing in her life the people she left in Israel. She does not hate them for uprooting her indefinitely from her country and forcing her into a situation she would rather not be in. She does not hate them because the Americans are not as strict or stringent as Israelis, because NCIS is much more lax than her Mossad.

They do not extend the same courtesy for her.

They hate her for being there when Kate could not be. They hate her for joining their team without their express permission. They hate her for the association she carries to the murderer of their friend. They hate her without knowing who she is. They hate her for no real reasons at all.

She is pretty sure he hates her the most.

It is not blatant. He offered her something to read, something that should have been a nice gesture, but the magazine he pulls out is graced on the cover by a mostly naked woman. He sounds sincere, interested at least moderately in her wellbeing.

But he makes those gestures, fakes that sincerity, because he thinks she is not staying. He thinks that his almighty leader will rectify the mistake that has been made against their team. He does not know that she and Gibbs share a secret that bonds them, at least somewhat.

And when Gibbs announces that she will be staying for a while she sees the expression on his face.

She makes a comment about how hard Gibbs is to read and he tells her it's a part of NCIS training. She tells him that he was thinking about doing page fifty-seven with her.

That was not the expression she read on his face. He wasn't thinking of having sex with her in that position or any other.

He was thinking about how she was not his beloved Kate. He was thinking about how many different ways he could possibly annoy her into packing up and leaving. He was thinking about how quickly he could be rid of her. He was thinking about how he did not like her.

Banished to the desk in the back, she knows that by not offering her Kate's now vacant desk they are not welcoming her. She can see the gesture for exactly what it is and it makes her tense, and she can feel Tony laughing at her back, she does not hear it but she can feel it.

As she empties her pockets onto Gibbs' desk she can feel them mocking her, judging her for being paranoid or for further demonstrating the wild, untamed assassin persona that they've attached to her.

It makes her blood run hot and she is determined to prove them wrong, prove to them that she is a valuable asset to their precious team.

But most of all, she is determined to prove it to him.

------------------------------------------------------------

I don't own NCIS blah blah blah.

The End- I hope you enjoyed! Thank you to everyone who took the time to review. And thank you to everyone who stuck with the story and favorited/added it to their alerts. It all meant a lot to me.

-Jessica


End file.
